


said their nevers slept their dream

by comradeocean



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Drabble Sequence, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-27
Updated: 2012-06-01
Packaged: 2017-11-04 09:51:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 877
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/392503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/comradeocean/pseuds/comradeocean
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A lot of things don't happen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Arya

Upon completion of her training she doesn't sail across the narrow sea on a purple galley. She is too old to be a cabin boy, but a girl learns tricks. Passing in and out of harbours, she makes easy friends with the crew because it's not words seafarers trade in, but the right knots, the right splicings of rope, the right offers and acceptances of wineskins filled with liquids as angry and dark as the waves.

After she disembarks, she doesn't kill the best friend of a man who's not her brother. Not even a pinprick he barely felt. She has seen too many faces, and she doesn't remember if they have ever met before, if there are any reasons for them to meet. Doesn't think if the glazed expression slowly overtaking his features ought to mean anything, as she watches from an anonymous, safe, distance away. Doesn't wonder at her slightest stirrings of disquiet.

She doesn't stiffen or chew her lip or otherwise catch herself losing the polish of her craft around blacksmiths, anonymous blacksmiths toiling in anonymous forges dotting a besieged land. It is good time to be in the business of war, she doesn't conclude, not wistfully, not even knowingly. 

At the inn she spends barely a night, she doesn't care to notice the fat baker who stares at her. They don't have room anyway, and she has never minded sleeping around horses. Making rough camp shouldn't calm her the way it does, but she is not surprised by what sorts of comfort no one needs to draw on.


	2. Gendry

He doesn't attach any special significance to oak trees. How little reward there is at the end for the amount of work it took is _annoying_ and _stupid_ , but not so that he particularly notices, pounding out acorn flour for Jeyne on days she is too worn out from keeping the rickety arrangements standing. 

When little Nan comes up to him with a handful of acorns, he doesn't scold her for hoarding vital harvest stores that could have been added to their shrinking provisions. He doesn't dutifully drill holes in them to string together like a necklace, or a little crown. 

The trees aren't bare, not that he hasn't any fascination for oak leaves. Too acidic to be useful for any ground cover for the garden. Too damp for tinder. He doesn't look at the greying, whitening world with all the colours leaking out of it and dream of green forests, town squares grimy with red dust blowing in from the harbour. He doesn't dream at all.

Later, much later, when the ground begins to soften again, the children don't ask about the walks they all take together, armed with a digging stick and small satchel of acorns. Once having made the circuit, they don't return to the grove of trees west of the stables and gather beneath his favourite tree because he doesn't have one. There are no stories to tell about someone he used to know.


	3. Sansa

News of the sudden and tragic death of her betrothed is not received with a hard little smile. She was walking with Arya along the walls, watching benevolently over her household as a lady should. Not training her vision in imitation of her sister's; not surveying the ruins of Winterfell beneath them with grim assassin eyes; trying to catch what Arya was searching for so that they might all find it. When Jon delivers the letter himself, concern crowding his features, she doesn't involuntarily glance at Arya instead, grey eyes and blue not locking together for just a moment longer than necessary. She never traces the edge of the unbroken seal with shaking hands or thinks to ask for privacy. Her two siblings do not stare at her retreating back as she leaves the both of them with brisk steps towards her solar.

Alone in the room, she chooses not hope, not gratitude, not even relief. She knows nothing, certainly nothing to school her expressions into. To need to know how would be insincere. She is sincere in her grief. She won't slip up, because there is nothing to cover.

Arya makes no late night visit to lie down beside her. There are no whispers of "Can you really run forever?" kissing against the hair that reminds them of their mother. Because she is asleep, the jut of her chin cannot say "but you will, and so can I." Because she is asleep, Arya has no need to answer with a promise, especially if a girl has no promises to keep.

There is no time before Jon leaves for The Wall again for him to find her alone and praying in the Godwood. No moment rife with hidden, unsaid words; they always say what they mean and mean what they say. Jon Snow knows better than to call it anything when there is nothing being asked and nothing being granted between his sisters. He does not presume to tell her that she can say no. No to the Northmen, no to dragons, to stags, to thorned roses. A thousand no's fluttering against the price of peace. She doesn't look up at him with wide untroubled eyes. "Why would I? It is the only thing I've ever wanted."


End file.
